The invention relates to rotary drill bits for drilling or coring holes in subsurface formations, and of the kind comprising a bit body having a shank for connection to a drill string, a plurality of cutter assemblies mounted on the bit body, and a passage in the bit body for supplying drilling fluid to the surface of the bit for cleaning and/or cooling the cutters. The invention also provides methods of designing such bits.
In a common form of such drill bits, each cutter assembly comprises an elongate stud which is received in a socket in the surface of the bit body, the stud having mounted at one end thereof a preform cutting element. The preform cutting element may be of the kind comprising a tablet, often circular or part-circular, having a thin hard cutting layer of polycrystalline diamond bonded to a thicker, less hard substrate, for example of cemented tungsten carbide.
In such a drill bit it is possible to calculate the volume of material removed from the formation by each cutter, per revolution, at any given rate of penetration. For example, computer systems are in use which allow such volumes to be calculated both in respect of existing manufactured drill bits as well as theoretical designs for such bits. The volume of material removed by each cutter is known as the "volume factor" and is subject to a number of variables. For example the volume factor of a particular cutting element will vary according to its axial or radial position relative to other cutting elements. Thus, if a cutting element is radially located on the bit so that its path of movement partly overlaps the path of movement of a preceding cutting element, as the bit rotates, it will remove a lesser volume of material than would be the case if it were radially positioned so that such overlapping did not occur, or occurred to a lesser extend, since the leading cutting element will already have removed some material from the path swept by the following cutting element.
Similarly, a cutting element which is axially positioned so that it projects further than another similar cutter from the surface of the bit body (or corresponding surface of rotation) may remove more material per revolution than said cutter.
Graphs may be plotted showing the volume factor of each cutting element against the radius of cutting, i.e. the distance of the centroid of the cutting from the central axis of the bit, (the "cutting" being the formation material removed by the cutting element). Such graphs may be comparatively smooth or may be "spiky", the presence of spikes indicating one or more cutters which are removing a greater volume of material per revolution than cutting elements at slightly lesser and slightly greater radii.
The actual volume of material removed by each cutter increases with increased rate of penetration of the drill bit and different graphs can therefore be drawn for different rates of penetration. Generally speaking, the "spikiness" of a graph will increase with increase in the rate of penetration.
Hitherto, it has been considered desirable for such graphs to be as smooth as possible so that each cutting element removes a similar volume of material to cutting elements at slightly lesser and slightly greater radii. (It will be appreciated that such cutting elements will not necessarily be adjacent one another on the actual bit body and may well be angularly displaced from one another by a considerable distance). It has been believed that a drill bit exhibiting a spiky volume factor graph is likely to suffer uneven wear, and thus premature failure, as a result of some cutting elements removing a greater volume of material per revolution and thus doing a greater share of the work.